A diet book

Yes, I read a diet book, and I'm suitably embarrassed. I chose to read The Petite Advantage Diet: Achieve That Long, Lean Look. The Specialized Plan for Women 5'4" and Under (maybe if I ate the title I wouldn't be hungry for the next week!) by Jim Karas, because it is aimed at short, fat females of which I am one.

Let me just save you $15 or a trip to the library. It comes down to this: don't eat foods that are white (except cottage cheese as it is a good source of protein), do eat lots of healthy protein and fruits and vegetables and strength train using a somewhat intimidating contraption called Gravity Straps.

I suspect by the end of this post, you'll understand that I'm a short, fat female who will probably stay that way. I didn't care for the tone of the book; it was a little too unprofessional for me. But Karas has written several books and helped many women lose weight. There were two new-to-me concepts in the book. The first was calorie cycling in which the short, fat female is aided in sticking to her calorie restrictions by having two days of eating 1,100 calories followed by a day of eating 1,600 calories. The second was the work-out plan which consisted only of strength training using Gravity Straps which are hung on a door and help you use your own body weight to build muscle. Even if my doors were sturdier than those break-apart kind they have in Hollywood or if I had any doors besides the bathroom door that had enough room outside it to do the workout, I'd still be worried by my general lack of coordination and fearful of the plan. If done properly, these exercises done in 31-minute sessions, should increase the heart rate enough to improve cardiovascular health.  Maybe I can start with some of the non-strap exercises and work my way up to the straps.

I didn't like that Karas said cardio exercise is a complete and utter waste of time (I think that's a direct quote, but I didn't use the quotation marks in case I'm actually paraphrasing). I like cardio exercise, and after telling me that I need to move my body for at least 90 minutes a day, I don't want to hear that some particular type of movement is a waste of time. On the other hand, I liked that he gave me permission never to train for or run a marathon. He considers cardio a waste because mostly people (at least the short, fat females) eat too much because of their work out. They go on that two-mile run with their girlfriends then immediately head over to the cafe for grande coffee and a giant muffin. That is a no-no.

On the whole, I didn't really learn a whole lot I didn't already know. But it's good to have the reminder that I need to practice what I know. It also helped to motivate me to increase the amount of time I spend doing strength training exercises, even if I'm not anywhere near where I should be.

So, on the whole, a useful read.